A Place at the Table

by Saadia Faruqi

  “We had a deal. No more video games,” Mom says.

  “I’m not,” David insists. “I’m just going down there to clean up.” He thunders down to the basement.

  Justin’s candy is spread over the kitchen table. As he gorges on sugar, Mom picks over his treats, checking for anything that’s open or “out of the question.”

  “Mom,” I ask, “what do you do when you and Aunt Louise have a fight?”

  She pops a gummy Life Saver into her mouth. “Are you and Maddy fighting? Is that why you didn’t trick-or-treat together?”

  I sit at the table and spin a small packet of Starburst. “Maddy went to some Halloween charity thing with this girl Stephanie. She says we’re her two best friends, but she acts like Stephanie is better than me.”

  It all comes rushing out, how Maddy didn’t write to me over the summer, how she’s more interested in swim team than Doctor Who, how she’s transforming into a ponytailed clone of Stephanie Tolleson.

  I sigh and unwrap one of Justin’s Twix bars, my favorite.

  He glares at me. “Rude. Ask first.”

  “Hmm,” Mom says. She stacks David’s empty pizza boxes. “Let me guess. Stephanie lives in a big house. She goes to the Montgomerys’ church.”

  “I’ve never been to her house, but you’re right about church.” Mom sinks heavily into a chair at the table. “So, about Aunt Louise,” I prompt her.

  She runs a hand through her short hair. “It’s different with a sister. One of us always apologizes. When friends have a falling-out, they don’t talk things over. They drop you. My best chum at school did that to me.”

  Justin pours a mini bag of M&M’s into his mouth. Mom swats his arm. “Oi!” she scolds him.

  What if Maddy decides she’s not my friend, then bottles up all the time we’ve spent together and puts it away on a shelf to gather dust? The thought makes me feel grimy, as if I’m a dusty old jar, waiting for Maddy to decide I’m useful.

  I slump, putting my elbows on the table and my chin in my hands.

  Mom asks, “What about your cooking-club partner? You’re always laughing together when I pick you up from class.”

  “I thought we were getting to be friends,” I say. “But when I asked her to go trick-or-treating, she got upset.”

  “A lot of religious people don’t celebrate Halloween,” Mom says. “Maybe it’s a touchy subject for her.”

  I hadn’t thought about it like that. “What should I do?”

  Mom stands up. “Why don’t you apologize? Do something nice for her. If you were grownups, I’d say, ‘Invite her to lunch.’”

  Mom slides Justin’s haul back into his plastic pumpkin. “Enough sweets for you, young man,” she says.

  “It’s called candy, Mom,” Justin corrects her.

  “I speak proper English, unlike some people around here,” Mom teases.

  David appears, carrying a garbage bag full of pizza crusts and soda cans. “Want to build a safe for your candy, Justin?” he asks. “I saw a cool Lego tutorial online.”

  Justin jumps up. “Yes! I’m going to lock up all my Twix bars so someone doesn’t take them.” He blinks at me.

  “Hey. Don’t forget who took you trick-or-treating,” I say.

  * * *

  The next morning, Sara walks up to me before homeroom. “I’m sorry I snapped at you about Halloween,” she says. She tugs at the sleeve of her tunic. It has lace edging. I wonder if it’s itchy.

  “I was going to apologize to you,” I say.

  “You didn’t do anything wrong. It’s just that I’m not allowed to dress up or go trick-or-treating. And forget about candy.” Sara presses her lips together, then lets out a breath. “I get so mad. I hate feeling left out.” She squishes her eyes almost closed. Before I can ask if she’s okay, Sara says, “That’s all. See you in class.”

  “Wait.” I step in front of her before she runs off. “Want to sit at my lunch table today?”

  She shakes her head. “Maddy hates me, remember?”

  Mrs. Kluck strides down the hallway, seeking out trouble. I can almost hear the ominous swish-swish of her pantyhose over the screeches and shouts of the sixth-grade hall. “No loitering at your lockers,” she calls over the noise. “Get your things and proceed to homeroom.”

  I stall, pretending to take a few more books out of my locker. “Maddy’s been spending most of lunch at Stephanie’s table,” I admit. “So, will you? Sit with me. And Micah.”

  “You mean abandon my corner near the bathrooms?” Sara puts a finger to her cheek, as if she has to give this serious thought. “I don’t know. I kind of like sitting by myself.” She keeps a straight face, but her sparkling eyes tell me she’s joking.

  I roll my eyes at her. “Please?”

  She’s back to fingering her sleeve, and suddenly I think of Justin when he was little. He used to have an old worn-out blankie he’d smooth over and over whenever he was scared or nervous. “What about Maddy?” Sara asks.

  “She can sit where she likes,” I say, reminding myself that Maddy has ditched me twice since school started. She chose Stephanie for her kitchen partner. And Stephanie again for Halloween.

  “It was so different at my old school,” Sara says. “We had twelve students in my class, and everybody was friends. Everybody!”

  “I thought you went to Bennett Branch Elementary.” It’s one of the bigger local schools around here, with even more students than we had at Watersville Elementary.

  “I went to a private school. My mosque runs it.” Sara puts her backpack on the ground as if she has a long story to tell. “It’s on the other side of the county. There aren’t enough Muslim kids out here to carpool or hire a bus. I guess my parents got tired of driving me every morning.”

  “I bet you miss your friends.” Our school is huge. There are three hundred kids in sixth grade alone.

  “I’m getting used to this place. Now that I have a friend here.” She looks right at me. I give her my biggest smile.

  “So, how about sitting with your friend?”

  The hallway seems suddenly silent. Are we friends? Sara seems as uncertain as I am, but I notice she’s not pulling at her sleeve anymore.

  “Deal,” Sara says. “As long as we can focus on our festival recipe.”

  The homeroom bell chimes. Mrs. Kluck claps her hands hard. “Get moving, sixth-graders!” she calls. Without a word, Sara and I dash to our homerooms.

  * * *

  The next day, I pass Sara a note during language arts: What are we cooking today?

  I can’t wait to get to the school kitchen, where the food is edible. Dad came home last night, and Mom tried to make a special dinner. She cut a recipe out of the Baltimore Sun, pasta with walnuts and anchovy sauce. Only we didn’t have anchovies in the house, so Mom used canned sardines. The result was noodles covered in Pepto-Bismol–pink gravy. Robin Hood ended up getting most of the pasta in his dog bowl.

  Sara checks to make sure Ms. Saintima isn’t watching, then opens the paper.

  Not telling! she writes back.

  Ms. Saintima sits on the edge of her desk. She’s wearing red-and-black batik pants and a Harry Potter scarf. Ms. Saintima is my favorite teacher at Poplar Springs. She’s young and cool and there’s a mile-high stack of fantasy novels on her desk that we’re allowed to borrow.

  “We’ve been talking about hero myths,” she says. “Ancient heroes like Beowulf and Athena. And modern ones: Superman. Wonder Woman.”

  Micah high-fives one of his guy friends. They’re both into comic books.

  “Your homework mission, should you choose to accept it . . .” A few kids groan at Ms. Saintima’s Mission: Impossible reference. “Write a paragraph about a real-life hero. You have a few minutes to get started now.”

  There’s a rush of pens across paper. Everyone tries to zip through the assignment so they won’t have homework this weekend.

  This topic isn’t so easy for me. My mom used to be my hero. When I was little, if I had trou
ble falling asleep, Mom would lie down with me and tell the story of how she left England. Mom always described herself as brave. She and Dad fell in love as college students, working at the performing-arts camp. Then she left behind her family, friends, even her religion to marry him.

  I used to think it was romantic, but now I know coming to America was Mom’s one and only adventure. It’s like she landed at Ellis Island, where immigrants used to enter the United States, and got permanently stuck there—afraid to make her way to solid American ground. I wish Mom were more like Mrs. Hameed, owning her own business, leading a club at our school.

  I want more than anything for Mom to take that citizenship test. Every time Dad is home, she drops hints about how much she wants to go to England. More than once, I’ve come home from school to find her searching for cheap flights on her phone. Aunt Louise is her only friend. I know what that’s like. At summer camp, when the other girls in my cabin were practicing choreography for “It’s a Hard Knock Life,” I was writing letters to Maddy. I couldn’t wait to get home, to see her. Of course Mom wants to go back and be where she can see her sister every day.

  Sara is right. What my mom needs is a buddy.

  I’m so busy thinking, the bell rings before I write a single word. I’ll write my paragraph later. Now that class is over, I dash over to Sara’s desk. “You can tell me now. What are we making?”

  “Nope,” she says. “You have to wait. And stop jumping up and down like that. It could be something disgusting, like tindas.”

  “Never heard of it,” I say as we head to the FACS room.

  “It’s a vegetable. It’s round and green and has no business being in any dish, ever.”

  “I have supreme faith in your mother’s cooking. She can make anything taste delicious. Even those tondas.”

  “Tindas! You’re really kooky, you know that?”

  Sara’s face has lost that pinched-up, Don’t distract me from my studies expression. Her smile is like a big hug I didn’t know I needed.

  “We still have to talk about our festival recipe,” I say. “We’re the perfect partners. I’m sugar. You’re spice.”

  Sara freezes outside the doorway, her smile gone. “Why am I spice? That’s kind of racist.”

  “How is that racist? I only took sugar because I like to bake.” Why is Sara so defensive? It’s not like I’m challenging her to a sauté-pan duel. Sara squares her shoulders. I get the feeling I’m supposed to know the answer to this question.

  “I don’t know how to explain,” she says. “It’s more of a feeling. My family’s from a part of the world that people associate with spices. It’s a whole stereotype. Someday I’ll tell you about my neighbor Mrs. Miles.”

  I want to ask what happened. Did her neighbor say something racist to Sara or Mrs. Hameed? Sara’s picking nervously at the edge of her tunic. I know she’s not ready to tell me that story.

  She says, “It’s like I can’t even cook without someone pointing out—you pointing out—that I’m exotic. I’m different. And you’re my friend.”

  “I was trying to say that we work well together,” I protest.

  “Then say that.”

  Sometimes talking with Sara is hard work. What do we have in common, besides the fact that our moms are both immigrants?

  That reminds me of Sara’s plan. I can picture our moms, sitting at a café table with their Learn About the United States books, sipping tea. And that’s when a great idea pops into my head.

  “Working on the recipe is the perfect excuse to get our moms together,” I say. “Operation High Tea.”

  “I don’t know what that is.” Sara raises a suspicious eyebrow at me.

  I twirl into the FACS room like a big goof. “That’s because I just made it up. I’ll explain during class.”

  13

  Sara

  ELIZABETH EXPLAINS HER PLAN to get our mothers together as we roll out spice-infused dough for this week’s recipe: samosas. According to Maddy and Stephanie, it looks like someone has dropped birdseed in the dough. Don’t they recognize cumin seeds by now?

  Mrs. Kluck is on her cell phone about some piece of kitchen equipment that was supposed to arrive this week. “I can’t believe this incompetence!” she yells.

  Mama practically shouts over her. “Samosas are Pakistani street food, similar to empanadas.”

  “Yum,” somebody calls out.

  “You want me to bring my mama to Bean Heaven?” I whisper to Elizabeth. “Who names a tea place ‘Bean Heaven,’ anyway?”

  “It’s a coffee shop,” Elizabeth says in a low voice while Mama sets out the ingredients for the samosa filling: cooked ground beef, onions, and fresh cilantro. “But they also have traditional British cream tea. Nan used to say it was the most authentic tea she’d had in the United States. It’s a whole thing. China teacups. Finger sandwiches and scones with clotted cream.”

  I can almost see her drooling.

  “I bet I can talk my mom into going today, after class,” she says. “Can you meet us?”

  “Today?” I chew my lip. I don’t like doing things without preparing. I need the exact words rehearsed in my mind. I can’t just improvise where Mama is concerned. Mama has a brain like a computer. She always knows when something is up.

  I cut the onions into slivers while Elizabeth breathes in the cilantro with eyes closed. “Have you ever smelled anything so bright and clean? It’s almost lemony.”

  I fold the onion and cilantro into the keema. “Every day of my life.”

  Mama teaches us to cut and shape the dough into little fans, fill it with keema and spices, and seal the pastry, forming palm-size dumplings, then carry them into the main kitchen, where she’s waiting with a pan full of hot oil. As Mama drops our samosas into the spattering oil, Elizabeth proclaims, “Hey! It’s a Pakistani knish!” Everyone stares at her, but a few girls nod.

  I raise an eyebrow. “I don’t know what a knish is.”

  “It’s Jewish street food—mashed potato in a pocket of fried dough—totally yummy.” Elizabeth takes a finished samosa off the plate and bites into it. “Do I detect a scrummy hint of cumin?” She puts on a proper British accent.

  “You’ve been watching too many cooking shows,” I tell her, and laugh.

  “I think I’m in love,” Elizabeth replies. “Can you marry a pastry?”

  “Don’t eat too many. If we’re going to make Operation High Tea work, you need to leave room for tea and scones.”

  Elizabeth sticks her pinky in the air as if she’s holding a delicate teacup. “One always has room for a spot of tea,” she says, still in a British accent.

  * * *

  “What sort of name is Bean Heaven for a tea shop?” Mama grumbles, trying to get comfortable on her stool at the coffee bar. She’s stacked her folders on the table, and now there’s no place for her cup of tea.

  I try to act cool, as if the exact same question hadn’t crossed my mind. “It refers to coffee beans, Mama,” I tell her calmly. “They serve tea and coffee.” I’m not allowed to drink coffee, so I order hot chocolate with whipped cream and sprinkles, even though it’s warm out for November. The drink is way too sweet, and the sprinkles get caught in my teeth, but I take sips to show Mama everything is fine. It wouldn’t do for her to get suspicious. “Mmm, this is nice. Just you and me!”

  She frowns. Oops. Too much. I look out the window with desperate eyes. Elizabeth had better get here fast with her mom.

  “Yes, it’s nice,” Mama admits, and relaxes beside me. “Tell me about school?”

  I almost drop my cup. “Um, art is going well,” I say. “We have this new assignment . . .”

  “Oh, my gosh, look who’s here!” an overly perky voice trills from the coffee shop’s counter. It’s Elizabeth, finally.

  I stand up so quickly, I almost knock over my stool. Elizabeth and her mom stand a few feet away, teacups in hand. I say, “Nice to see you, Mrs. Shainmark. Have you met my mother?” then kick myself because didn’t she meet Ma
ma when she picked up Elizabeth last week? Elizabeth watches her mother closely, even as we’re talking. Mrs. Shainmark has a faraway look in her eyes.

  Thankfully, a Bean Heaven employee with long blond dreadlocks inserts himself into our awkward little tableau with a big plate of scones, jam, and thick cream.

  “Elizabeth tells me you’re British,” Mama says. “How do you like the U.S.?”

  Mrs. Shainmark settles herself on a stool and pulls the plate of scones closer. Her short brown hair is the only thing that makes her look different from other moms at Poplar Springs Middle. Her jeans and green sweater are nondescript. For a moment, I’m glad Mama stands out, with her hijab and colorful tunic.

  “I’ve been here more than fifteen years.” Elizabeth’s mother looks down at her cup of tea. Her mouth settles into a downward curve, as if her whole face feels heavy. But when she looks up again, there’s a new light in her eyes. “They say England is gray, but everything about America is too bright. Sometimes I wake up wondering how I’ll get through another day of Type-A personalities and firm handshakes.” She smiles, a little sadly. “To be honest, I’m just trying to get by.”

  Elizabeth and I widen our eyes at each other.

  “It’s not that bad, Mom,” she protests weakly.

  Mrs. Shainmark takes a scone and passes the plate to Mama, then butters her pastry with the thick cream. “You’re right, Els,” she says. “I have you and your brothers.”

  “And Robin Hood,” Elizabeth says. “He’s our dog,” she explains.

  Mrs. Shainmark pushes Elizabeth’s long bangs to the side, out of her eyes. “Let’s ask Mrs. Hameed. What do you think of Americans? Be honest.”

  “Please call me Hina.” Mama smiles again, her eyes crinkling at the corners. “These kids think everything is perfect here. What do they know about emigrating from your home and trying to manage in a new country?”

  “Exactly!”

  For a few seconds, the conversation stills. Clinking plates and the sound of steaming milk fill the lull. Then Elizabeth jumps in. “Mrs. Hameed is also studying for the citizenship test, Mom.”